Supported Scripts

The Unicode Standard encodes scripts rather than
languages. When writing systems for more than one language
share sets of graphical symbols that have historically related
derivations, the union of all of those graphical symbols is treated
as a single collection of characters for encoding and is identified
as a single script. Each script then serves as an inventory of
graphical symbols, which are drawn upon for the writing systems of
particular languages. In many cases, a single script, such as the
Latin script, may be used to
write tens or even hundreds of languages. In other cases, only one language employs a
particular script—for example, Hangul, which is typically used only
to write the Korean language. The writing systems for some languages
may also use more than one script; for example, Japanese
traditionally makes use of the Han (Kanji), Hiragana, and Katakana
scripts, and modern Japanese usage commonly mixes in the Latin
script as well.

The scripts supported by the Unicode Standard include all of those listed in the following table. The listing in the table is ordered by the version of the Unicode Standard in which a particular script was first encoded. In many instances, supplemental characters for a given script have been encoded in subsequent versions of the standard, after the initial addition of the script.

Version (Year)

Scripts Added

1.1 (1993)

Arabic

Gujarati

Lao

Armenian

Gurmukhi

Latin

Bengali

Han

Malayalam

Bopomofo

Hangul

Oriya

Cyrillic

Hebrew

Tamil

Devanagari

Hiragana

Telugu

Georgian

Kannada

Thai

Greek

Katakana

2.0 (1996)

Tibetan

3.0 (1999)

Braille (patterns)

Mongolian

Syriac

Canadian Syllabics

Myanmar

Thaana

Cherokee

Ogham

Yi

Ethiopic

Runic

Khmer

Sinhala

3.1 (2001)

Deseret

Gothic

Old Italic

3.2 (2002)

Buhid

Tagalog

Hanunóo

Tagbanwa

4.0 (2003)

Cypriot

Osmanya

Ugaritic

Limbu

Shavian

Linear B

Tai Le

4.1 (2005)

Buginese

Kharoshthi

Syloti Nagri

Coptic

New Tai Lue

Tifinagh

Glagolitic

Old Persian Cuneiform

5.0 (2006)

Balinese

Phags-pa

Sumero-Akkadian Cuneiform

N'Ko

Phoenician

5.1 (2008)

Carian

Lycian

Saurashtra

Cham

Lydian

Sundanese

Kayah Li

Ol Chiki

Vai

Lepcha

Rejang

5.2 (2009)

Avestan

Inscriptional Parthian

Old South Arabian

Bamum

Javanese

Old Turkic

Egyptian Hieroglyphs

Kaithi

Samaritan

Imperial Aramaic

Lisu

Tai Tham

Inscriptional Pahlavi

Meetei Mayek

Tai Viet

6.0 (2010)

Batak

Brahmi

Mandaic

6.1 (2012)

Chakma

Miao

Takri

Meroitic Cursive

Sharada

Meroitic Hieroglyphs

Sora Sompeng

7.0 (2014)

Bassa Vah

Mahajani

Pahawh Hmong

Caucasian Albanian

Manichaean

Palmyrene

Duployan (shorthand)

Mende Kikakui

Pau Cin Hau

Elbasan

Modi

Psalter Pahlavi

Grantha

Mro

Siddham

Khojki

Nabataean

Tirhuta

Khudawadi

Old North Arabian

Warang Citi

Linear A

Old Permic

8.0 (2015)

Ahom

Hatran

Old Hungarian

Anatolian Hieroglyphs

Multani

Sutton SignWriting

9.0 (2016)

Adlam

Marchen

Osage

Bhaiksuki

Newa

Tangut

10.0 (2017)

Masaram Gondi

Soyombo

Nushu

Zanabazar Square

In addition to the above scripts, a number of other collections
of symbols are also encoded by Unicode. These collections include
the following: